Thursday, April 28, 2011

Review: Why I read this book: I love Michael Crichton and I love medical thrillers so this sounded like something I would love.

My Thoughts: Wow, this is a very exciting book from the very first page. I love how the story unfolds right before your eyes, letting you see the characters layer by layer. Every time you think you understand the characters, you learn just a bit more about them to add more and more to the suspense plot.

The characters are very well done in Hybrid. I felt like I got to know each of the main players pretty well. Enough to empathize or hate each one of them. None of them felt half-developed to me and I thought they were done really well.

The plot is amazing. Both the characters and the plot move this book along and it's a great balance. I never felt like the science was too much either. It was a good balance of making the science understandable and making it interesting and moving the story along at a breakneck speed.

I really can't think of anything bad about the book. There were a few typos, but nothing that made it impossible to read. Other than that, Hybrid is a pretty amazing medical suspense/thriller and I will definitely look for more of Dr. Brian O'Grady's work in the future. He made Hybrid extremely exciting from first page to the last and that is what I love in a book from this genre.

My Rating: 4.5/5.0About the Book:

What sort of untapped abilities
lie within the human brain? Could we summon the powers of telepathy,
telekinesis or mind control if we only knew how? Dr. Brian O’Grady, a Washington neurosurgeon,
explores these intriguing questions in his pulse-pounding medical thriller HYBRID (The Fiction Studio; April 2011).
“We have limitless connections between the nerve cells in our brains, yet
we only use about 10 percent. Imagine if we could unlock our vast
potential?” he asks. The key in Dr. O’Grady’s debut novel is
a virus, which unleashes a chain of events in same spine-tingling spirit of
suspense as The Andromeda Strain
and the X-Files.

Seven years ago, everyone
died in the Honduran camp from the EDH1 virus, but Red Cross worker Amanda
Flynn. Airlifted home to America,
medical professionals tried to identify why Amanda survived when others died
gruesome, agonizing deaths or became violent savages. Little did they know that
anyone who survived…changed.

Since her escape from
quarantine, Amanda has been in hiding slowly realizing the powers that could
have only come from her infection. She can sense things, do things using her
mind, things that are incredible and sometimes incredibly dark. But as she
resists the pull toward violence, a new survivor has entered her consciousness
– one without her will to block evil impulses. One who revels in
bloodlust and seeks to expand his mastery by forcing the end of human society.
And he’s coming for Amanda.

A sharply written and
engaging cast of characters adds to the fever excitement and suspense –
Dr. Phil Rucker, the coroner whose Asperger’s syndrome comes complete
with its own demons; Father John Oliver, the kindly priest whose faith is
brutally tested; Rodney Patton, the homicide chief who sees what others miss;
and Greg Flynn, Amanda’s father-in-law and the man whose moral center
guides others in the storm.

About the Author:

Brian O’Grady
follows in the tradition of Michael Crichton as a physician who brings his
in-depth medical knowledge to his craft. A practicing neurosurgeon from Richland, WA,
O’Grady is a graduate of the University
of New Mexico who
completed his residency in neurosurgery at the Mayo Clinic. His deep insight
into the mysterious workings of the human brain brings HYBRID realistically to life.